Smith's Bible Dictionary (1863)
(hamlet), a city of Israel which Judah captured from Jeroboam. (2 Chronicles 13:19) It has been conjectured that this Ephrain or Ephron is identical with the Ephraim by which Absalom’s sheep-farm of Baal-hazor was situated; with the city called Ephraim near the wilderness in which our Lord lived for some time; and with Ophrah, a city of Benjamin, apparently not far from Bethel. But nothing more than conjecture can be arrived at on these points.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (1898) & Schaff's Bible Dictionary
E'PHRAIN (Hebrew, Ephron, two fawns), one of the places taken from Israel by Judah, 2 Chr 13:19; perhaps Ophrah is meant, though some think it is the same as the "city called Ephraim" to which Jesus retired. John 11:54. This was in the wilderness, perhaps at el-Taiyibeh, about 5 miles north-east of Bethel.